Quantum DLT-v4 SATA drive issues

Just a mini-post after fixing an issue with a Quantum SATA DLT-V4 drive. The drive is installed into a Dell T105 server running SBS 2003 and seemed to install without any issues. The problem occurred when first starting to use the drive with NTbackup (it was the first time the drive had been used). When trying to run a quick backup NTBackup was unable to view the tape in the drive “There is no free media available with the selected type”

At first I tried a few new tapes thinking that it was just a fault tape. I even installed the trial of Symantec Backup Exec 11d that came with the drive to see if it was able to mount the tapes but all it got was “Bad Media” nothing seemed to help.

It turns out the issue was down to UDMA not being enabled on the disk controller (in windows) that seemed to be somehow interfering with the server communicating to the drive.

Open device manager

Expand “IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers”

Find the controller with the drive attached (Secondary IDE in my case)